Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Does anyone like the Origin system?

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Would have been far greater if it was more like the origin system from Dragon Age: Origins. Namely that you get a different introductory chapter to the game that is based on what background or "origin" you picked for your character (origin which could be based on race, class, social status the PC has). Imagine being able to play as a noble from Waterdeep, an Uthgardt barbarian, a pirate from Luskan, or a drow renegade from Menzobarranazan, etc. That would automatically make the game massively more replayable, and certainly quite fitting for an epic D&D RPG.

I personally don't feel that playing NPCs is appropriate for a D&D/FR RPG. True RPGs should be about making your own character, instead of playing something made by someone else.

i've been replaying da:o and the origin aspect is terrible imo, the worst part of the game: forced into a very small number of preset "origin stories" with no option to opt out. If being forced to play through a fixed "human noble" path or "poor dwarf" path is what comes to mind when you think of "making your own character" then idk what sort of da:o nostalgia people are still getting 2020 mileage from.

I have played only origins in DOS2 and it was cool, so look forward and also plan playtrough with Shadowheart. But first will be custom to see companion stories from another perspective.

To elaborate: DA:O takes away much of the opportunity to craft any sort of backstory to your character because it is fixed, hardcoded into the gameplay, and in a particularly trite and prescriptive way. If anyone wants BG3 to be made more like DA:O all they would need to do would be to remove custom protagonists and require the player to pick one of the origin characters at start.

Edit: another good way to make BG3 like DA:O would be to add an npc in the camp that flogs dlc. now thats the true to form bioware experience i crave

I think the origins in DAO was an idea that sounded good on paper, but in true BioWare fashion became a total Charlie Foxtrot. They had to cut half of the origins they had planned, and it’s so much work for content that is inaccessible in any given playthrough. How much better would it have been if the game started in a fixed point and then branched out wildly in the final chapter based on your decisions rather than starting at disparate points and then funneling into the same story? IMO they inverted what makes a good RPG.

Also, DAO only had three races and three classes. BG3 has 12 classes, more races and distinct subraces than I feel like counting, and backgrounds. There is no way DAO style origins would be reasonable.

I can understand criticisms of restrictiveness, though I personally prefer a grounding of the character in the world and introducing it properly - as opposed to Larian's blank slate custom PC.

But if we are comparing Origin Stories from DA:O to Origin Characters from BG3 by this standard, I would argue that the latter is the greater offender, as it comparably takes more elements out of the player's hands while simultaneously not delivering any of the advantages that Origin stories had.

As someone who isn't really troubled by being given a role to play with some preexisting history, I thought the origin chapters in DA:O really made that game, introducing you to the world better than any fetch quests in Candlekeep or long paragraphs of exposition before an intro cinematic. I don't think BG3 would need to make anything near as extensive as Dragon Age's prologues to make something that better establishes the world and your place in it.

Currently the custom MC is like every wakes up with amnesia character, but worse because they actually do have a history that you don't really know anything about. I'm interested to see how we'll learn about the origin characters histories when playing them otherwise roleplaying as them will be all the more troublesome.
Astarion NPC, has lived a long life of abuse by his master that has made him self-serving and insensitive to the plight of others, Astarion the PC, how much of that history with Cazador will we learn of in order to play this way, or to believably not play that way?

EDIT: and for good measure Dragon age Orgins - Next gen RPG

I think we will learn much of Astarion's story through his dreams.

Dreams? Is that something that's been spoiled?

I really liked the origin sections in DA:O. One of my favorite features of that game, honestly.

Me as well it was a very clever way of adding origins to a game and added replay-ability to the story.

In general? Depends on the game.

In this game? Hard to tell until it's playable, but I loved it in DOS:2. From what I've seen datamined this game will be even better, so I'd be surprised if I didn't.

That said, I always do a couple of runs on a custom character first, then do Origin runs to 'get to know' the character details I missed in the custom runs. Definitely adds replayability.

You get some detail in the current EA content just by playing in a manner that befriends Astarion.

The actual dream from his point of view is datamined/accessed via mods however.

I really enjoyed the Origins of Dragon Age Origins, but I don't like the origin system in this game or in DoS and DoS 2

I liked the origins in DA:O--I didn't find it that restricting for my personal role play and I enjoyed their individual stories. That said, I don't think that format would work with bg3, given how many races and classes are available. I think having some quests tied to your background would work though and would be really cool. Similar to how it's handled in GW2 but perhaps less involved. If the quests were tied to one element of your character's background then it would provide some nice anchoring in the story while still giving the player freedom to determine their own backstory. For example, it could be tied to your background as a criminal, noble, soldier, or what have you. There's already small things tied to those backgrounds (such as the Baldurian dialogue options) that we didn't choose and were determined by race/background so having some quests tied to that wouldn't take away much more freedom.

That would be really cool, I hope they add some content related to your background.

One thing I have thought about: if are from Baldur’s Gate then we must have a residence in the city. It would be really nice if that residence reflected our character in some way.

There is people with origins in our storyline, how can you like or not like that? What else could be ?

I don't have an issue with BG3 having Origin Characters (and i did enjoy DA:O origins as well) as long as they can be customized somewhat, but related to custom chars (which i also like to play with) story and personality I agree and Larian could experiment a bit more by giving us more options to alter their backgrounds and make them feel a little bit more personal.

There are multiple ways devs can alter char background in an RPG, for example a character can reveal more deep details about her/his background during dialogues with companions and other npcs who are asking about her/his past. For example if she/he is a Folk Hero the character can describe how he/she became a Folk Hero via different dialogue options. This choice can be memorized by the game and used for an npc reaction later in the game even (Hey its you who did this and that). Let the player decide on the go and roleplay. But this is just one way.

There can be origin templates as others already mentioned which if cleverly designed basically are giving you origin characters but with no restriction on race, appearance, personality and some flexibility on classes. Personality can be altered by Personality Tags again if cleverly done.

I also like what the Realms Beyond (the available combat demo) does with your history, it alters the predefined origin text you are able to choose from (scoundrel, farmhand, craftsman) by how you distributed stats and skills, which is really cool. Basically the game tells you how your characters abilities served him/her and evolved while reaching her/his early life goals (defined by the chosen origin story). For example Artist background with only medium Dexterity reflected:
Levi tried his hand at the traditional arts of Pyrrhenia: pottery, sculpture and painting. Levi's works were mediocre, but he showed promise and earned enough denarii to make a decent living.
As you alter your stats, its fascinating to see how your pre-story changes, i think its really clever, feels personal and not too much resource it needed to implement (a lot of planning though).

Overall I just hope Larian also can add more cool flavour to custom backgrounds.